Dragonflies and Damselflies of Oregon
By Cary Kerst & Steve Gordon – (2011)
304 pages; matt art paper, with 275 colour photographs, 30 identification charts/tables, 4 colour regional maps & 1 local map.
Soft Cover: 21.6cm x 14cm
ISBN: 978-0-87071-589-1
Oregon State University Press, Corvallis
There have been a number of odonate books in recent times that not only act as a field guide but also as a tour guide to the best odonate watching locations of a particular area, and this marvelous book can be added to that list. The emphasis of this book is specifically on the 91 odonate species (approximately 20% of the entire species numbers of the USA and Canada) known to the state of Oregon.
The opening pages include life history, morphology, local geography and odonate distribution. The many identification charts are packed with many color illustrations and photos (not included in the data count above) and the id chart of the 10 species of Sympetrum is particularly nice. Distribution notes both global and local are provided with local distribution enhanced by the inclusion of a colour shaded map. The photos in this book are mostly very good to excellent, either taken in the field or posed and in some cases provide colour variation of some species accompanied by very helpful descriptions with extra notes on distinguishing closely related species. Each species also has its flight season and also again in the back of the book are flight season charts for the species.
This is a thoughtful and very useful book with a simple and effective user friendly layout, which is not only beautifully illustrated as a field guide it is also a great odonate watching tour guide with precise directions to 30 selected sites in Oregon. All up, this is yet another good book on the odonates of the USA and is furthermore very useful as a partial species guide for Canada and makes a worthy addition to any odonate library.
Rod Rice
Principal Reviewer
Nature & Travel Books